Mutagen

<strong>Day 155 - 11:21 AM - Visayan Sea, Central Visayas, Philippines</strong>

About half an hour before noon, three creatures flew over the dangerous Visayan Sea. One was an enormous reddish-black dragon, another was a giant black ash-colored bird with silver primary, secondary, and tail feathers, and the last one was a black horse with wings. On the back of these creatures, people sat while carefully watching over the surroundings.

Of course, it was no other than Mark's group. They were already on their way home.

"Uncle, can I ride on the Pegasus later? Please?"

Emika cutely tried to request Mark as they rode on Chaflar's back.

The Pegasus, Greos, was as large as a regular horse. Only two people could safely ride on it. Three if one was a small child. At this moment, it was Edzel and Pearl that was on its back.

"Later." Mark strictly replied. "With how 'lively' you are, you'll likely end up falling from its back for no reason."

Hearing that, Emika pouted. However, she could not refute him either. There was no way that she could promise to sit still on the back of Greos. Besides, she had no experience riding on the back of any animal alone. The back of an animal like a horse was easy to fall off, after all. It was unlike the backs of Chaflar and Trua, who were large creatures.

It was also the perfect timing for Edzel to separate from the group. Although the peak of his anger had already passed throughout the night, he was still awkward towards Pefile and Celine.

That was something that could not be forced, no matter how much Celine wanted to spend time with her son. They should take it slow. After all, only time could heal the wound of the heart.

In any case, Mark had many things in mind to bother with other people's family problems.

The encounter with the Visayan Goddess of the Sea and Underworld, Magwayen, had given Mark quite an amount of information to digest.

First was more clues about the existence of realms.

Mark had already heard a bit of this subject from Bathala. The fact that Bathala himself came from not just another dimension but another realm. It was a realm lower than the one that Earth's Universe belonged to and the same reason that Bathala was weaker compared to other Gods of Creation that came from a higher realm.

From the conversation last night, it seemed that one of the goals of the gods was to ascend to a higher realm. It was also the reward that the Eyes decided to give the remaining gods hidden on Earth to make them help with the incoming disaster.

It meant that there was something to it that made the gods want it. Even a supreme god, like Magwayen, was tempted to that offer.

Mark wanted to ask more about it as he was curious. Although he had some theories, most of them came from things he remembered from novels, manga, and the like. He was not sure whether it was the same as the actual thing.

However, before Mark could ask Nineteenth, who had the authority over such information, the Eye in question had already left.

When Mark and Pefile went out of the chambers after meeting Magwayen, the only person left outside waiting for them was Fourth. As for Nineteenth, she already left without a single word for Mark. It was quite strange considering how she seemed to want to maintain a suitable behavior in front of Mark.

It was not surprising for Mark, however. During the conversation with Magwayen, Nineteenth was already showing signs of unnatural irritation. Though rather than prejudice towards foreign Gods as an Earth's protector, it was more like she hated them to the bone.

This might be one of the reasons why Nineteenth was the only one among the Eyes who was not tasked with personally handling the hidden gods and was left to support in the background instead.

Nineteenth leaving the place, however, removed the chance of Mark learning about it. On the other hand, Fourth seemed to have no authority to divulge the specifics of the topic. It was like before when Mark inquired Fourth about Aimee.

The second thing was about the happenings never told within the myths. Kaptan's death because of a fatal injury, for example.

It was not a shocking thing, of course. It was just most humans never paid attention.

Most myths told and passed from generation to generation were not necessarily from the people subject of the myth. A whole lot of these legends and stories, possibly all or at least the majority, were renditions of the events told by the mouths of ancient people. Not everything was true, while some were exaggerated.

The third thing was about the existence of Kahilwayan.

One would think that such a place would exist in another world only connected to Earth through the so-called gates. It was similar to how Asgard and Mount Olympus were depicted in many works of literature.

However, it seemed that, by what Magwayen had said, Kahilwayan was actually a god-created sub-space that was made on Earth. It gave Mark more work to do in the future, but it could end up as a good thing.

While those thoughts lingered in Mark's mind, Mei called him.

"Gege, something is odd."

"Hmm?" Mark turned to Mei. "What is it?"

What Mark saw was Mei's eyes dilating, indicating that she was using her abilities. Her attention was on the shallow area of the water.

"I don't know, but doesn't the water look too low."

Mark also stared at the area where Mei was looking. There, they could see large corals sticking out of the water. The water plants were also crumpled on the water surface. It indicated that the leaves of these plants were longer than the height of the tide.

At this moment, Berrak spoke on the radio.

"Boss, it seems like the Earth's magnetic field is going haywire."

"Now that you mention it."

Mark picked up the radio with a frown. Now that Berrak mentioned it, he also began to pay attention. He had lightning abilities, and electricity and magnetism had a direct correlation. It was rather faint, however, for Mark to feel it immediately.

As for Berrak, it was actually not him but his Thunderbird, Trua, who noticed. Animals had higher sensitivity to their surroundings, and birds, especially migratory ones, use magnetic fields to navigate.

"It should be an effect of the Planteray Debris," Mark stated. "It might also be the one messing up with the tide."

Then, something entered Mark's mind, which made him pause.

"Master, is something wrong?"

Amihan, who was sitting on Mark's shoulder, noticed his silence immediately.

"I just thought of something bad." Mark shrugged. "Earth's magnetic field going crazy can cause a lot of problems. If the magnetic field in some parts of Earth thinned, space radiation could enter those areas. If it was before the apocalypse, that problem would only cause health problems to people and EMP effects on appliances. But now, it's likely that the space radiation will cause the infected to mutate instead. Who knows what kind of mutations irradiated infected would end up with."

That surely was a problem.

"Let's just wish it's not anywhere near us."

Mark shrugged.

With those things in mind, the group continued traveling.

Initially, Mark wanted to fly back to Catanduanes to check before going home. However, considering how far it was to take a detour, Mark dropped the idea. In any case, his family was under the protection of Diwata Iraya. There should not be any problem there.

Mark just wished that they could fly continuously without breaks. However, Chaflar still had his maximum flight limit. Although he could fly long distances, it was not continuous. Thus, they still had to make their way through land every two hours.

At these times, Mark could not help but wish that Chaflar was a magical dragon instead of a giant mutated lizard. Well, that was wishing for too much.

Amihan was also helping with regulating wind resistance and other wind-related problems. Thus, Chalfar could fly faster than its regular speed without fear of making Mark and the others fall off. Of course, the dragon was not careless. If one of them fell because of it, Mark would surely punish it.

Following that flight routine, they reached the island of Marinduque before sunset.

However, as they flew closer to Luzon, they could not help but see the odd scene in the northwest.

The northwest sky was covered in thick black clouds, exuding lightning at a frightening frequency. There was also a burnt smell in the air. Not to mention that the same direction was blurred by what seemed to be grayish-brown mist in the distance.

"That looks dangerous..."

Mark muttered as they made their way to the island. Although Mark was in a hurry to go home, it was dangerous to fly throughout the night. The travel also made everyone tired. Everyone needed to rest, and they only had to continue their journey early in the morning tomorrow.

"Boss! Where are we going to camp?"

Berrak called from the radio.

There was silence for a bit. Mark was also choosing where to go.

"Let's land on the summit of that mountain first," Mark replied, looking at the mountain in the southern area of Marinduque. "If it's suitable, we can camp there. If not, it's easy to look for other places from there."

The group landed on the summit of the mountain, and before they could even land, they already found a vacant area to camp in. Mark monitored the area and did not detect any living creature in the immediate vicinity. The grass and plants that covered the area were lush, but there seemed to be no mutated ones either.

"Looks like this place is good."

Geronimo said after searching around for a bit together with Padua.

"Let's set up camp here," Mark said as he took out tents and other stuff from out of nowhere.

This scene was still magical for the two soldiers, and they could only watch with bitterly amazed expressions. It was a good thing, however.

Most people in the apocalypse were struggling with stuff. They might be able to find a good amount of supplies. However, not all people had the ability or resources to transport everything.

Mark's group, on the other hand, had magical storage rings that could store a whole lot of stuff without problems.

Night came, and they had an early dinner. Still, their attention was not on their food but the thick thunderous clouds in the northwest sky. It was a worrying sight.

With Mark's offline map, they managed to deduce that those clouds were volcanic clouds that likely came from the Taal Volcano. It was quite surprising since they did not expect a volcanic eruption to happen. Nonetheless, nature's fury was totally unpredictable without proper people and equipment to monitor it.

Still, the appearance and spread of the volcanic clouds were too strange. It seemed that the eruption was too strong for the clouds to be visible for over a fifty-kilometer radius of the volcano.

Rather than worrying about it, however, Mark focused more on the more important things.

The Taal Volcano was on the southwest side of Luzon. Quezon was on the east. It would be unlikely for these volcanic clouds to travel about a hundred kilometers away and reach their base.

That was why they only need to travel on the east side of Luzon and avoid those dangerous clouds and the veil of volcanic ash.

And there, the group spent their night on the summit of Mount Malinding in Marinduque.

The night was not all peaceful, though.

Mark detected some animals lurking in the shadows. Nonetheless, they did not receive any kind of attack throughout the night. It seemed that the animals deemed them dangerous, especially with Chaflar sleeping outside the camp.

The night felt short, and the sun rose soon.

After having breakfast and tidying up the camp, they finally their last day outside before the second wave came.